Better Offers: Foreign and Domestic
by jenni3penny
Summary: Post 'Yankee White' AU. Third of 'Better Offers'. KIBBS. "The man wasn't a count-it-out-to-ten sort of problem. She'd need an abacus, scrap paper and probably a scientific calculator just to keep from jamming something hard directly into his crotch if he started in again."


Arrogant son of a bitch, he'd taken her keys down into that hole with him.

Kate kicked the socked heel of her foot into the half open basement door and leaned into the frame, sucking in a long drawn breath through her nose, "I do know how to call a cab, ya know?"

There was a dank and sinking shift of silence from downstairs before she heard the thwap of something hard smacking into something that seemed equally thick and resilient. "Phone's on the wall, Todd."

 _Oh, hell. Oh, no, hell no._

She wasn't about to let him pout in that basement all night by himself. Space, yeah. They both needed a hell of a wide berth at the moment and she blocked them apart by levels while swinging the door roughly closed, enjoying the satisfying thunk the latch made as it engaged.

Space. For breathing. A hell of a lot of counted breathing.

The man wasn't a count-it-out-to-ten sort of problem. She'd need an abacus and scrap paper and probably a scientific calculator just to keep from jamming something hard directly into his crotch if he started in again.

But if he thought for one minute he was going to take his temper out on her and then be able to shy-and-sweet-and -silly his way back after stewing over his boat all night long?

 _Wrong, Jethro. Sooooo very wrong._

He'd have to climb those stairs at some point.

Unless he planned to piss in his bourbon jar or crawl out the damn window.

* * *

Well... he obviously had superior bladder control. Or he had, actually, gone out the window.

Because he'd lasted about an hour and a half longer than she'd figured he would, especially when she'd seen him chugging down cold coffee right about in the middle of her slinging something derogatory (and far less than lady-like) in his direction.

Kate slanted back farther onto the couch, stretching her lower spine out as she sank her eyes closed and her head into the low cushioning. She'd debated doing a whole slew of things that she knew would just aggravate him more – starting with extremely high volume cranking on the stereo. The fighting had exhausted her too much for that sort of petulance, though. She didn't want the sound.

She'd been able to hear him slamming things around at first, caught the faintest sounds of him working. And she'd been surprised that a sound that she usually found so comforting had just itched a tingling of anger over her already flushed skin. Then, because she'd realized how hot skinned and sweated her annoyance had gotten her she'd considered raising the heat in the basement to ninety just to punish him for hiding out.

It'd seemed like a really good idea at first.

Until she'd actually caught herself reaching for the thermostat panel and near smacked herself for acting like a child.

But, _God_ , he was infuriating.

And she thought DiNozzo was juvenile - he had her pouting around in his living room like a put out seven year old.

Absolutely infuriating.

* * *

He side-watched her descend the stairs, squinted into how gracefully slowly she made the movements with her hands full and her socks hushing on gritted steps. Gibbs lifted his head as she rounded down off the last one silently, her eyes meeting his even as she intentionally kept up the silent treatment. She'd used it before. Wasn't anything surprising. Just hadn't used it to quite this severity yet.

But frankly, he'd rather she wasn't talking to him if all she was gonna do was give him another round of the same self righteous, uppity, modern-woman-psycho-analyzing-her-lover swinging bull -

"You need to eat." The control in her blanked and voided tone impressed him. Not a whimper of giving in, not a feint of emotion.

Sometimes he assumed she was limitless in how strong she could be.

Sometimes that was the most comforting thing about her.

Gibbs blinked over how heavily she set the plate down beside the mess of paperwork he'd strewn out over the work bench, turning to completely take in her profile as she angled the coffee aside from the papers. He slanted his arm over the measured plans he'd been sketching out when he'd finally given up on trying to scrape and squint tired eyes over the same case information _again_.

Pride was all fine and well when one was in the right - but she was the one being sweetly selfless, regardless of how angry she probably still was.

So, yeah, he murmured "Thank you."

The snort of derision she let out was pithy answer enough, her face passively blanked and pale even as she tugged his glasses from the way they dragged a 'V' down the top hem of her tank. He avoided watching the smooth and stretchy fabric slink back tight against her breasts as she lifted his glasses open and just shook her head into aiming them toward him.

 _Yup, still pissed. And twice as gorgeous._

He could see that in the flecked green that rose in her eyes as she met his glance, a glare angling her head as he just lifted his closer to her scrutiny.

He'd stopped being angry an hour before (although, stubborn was still playing itself out) but she still seemed to be an awfully pretty picture of semi rage. He was learning how lovely a little bit of angry looked on Caitlin Todd. Full feisty and far from pure. Damn dark and delicious.

"I don't know what to do with you." She admitted quietly as she slid his glasses onto his face and shook her head again, like the words alone couldn't convey how lost she was in the world of Leroy Jethro Gibbs.

He woulda carved a map into the floor for her with a spoon if he'd had an inkling as to which direction was which when it came to dealing with him.

Shit, he couldn't deal with himself half the time.

 _Didn't I warn you, Katie? Didn't I tell you this was where we were gonna end up?_

"S'pose you want your keys."

She just shrugged at him like it didn't actually matter, her face softening more than he'd expected as she chewed into her bottom lip. "I'm not going anywhere, Gibbs."

 _Good girl, don't you give up. Not so easily anyhow._

His hand reached past the coffee to tap the side of the uncovered varnish can, sloshing the liquid a little with the movement of it, blossoming the heady smell of it between them. "Well, not in _your_ car, anyhow."

There was a slim possibility of violence in her widened eyes as she looked back up at him from the can, sheening them a verdant tinted caramel as she looked from the canister to his face. "Bastard."

"Remote starter?"

 _Don't smile, don't smile, don't..._

 _Shit._

 _Busted._

"You know it is." She glared at the smirk that was stubbornly tugging at one side of his mouth.

Gibbs gave her a supposedly lazy lift of one shoulder, keeping his voice toned quiet and hazy as he let himself glance down the tensed front of her. "Was."

Her hands caught against the slacked way his sweats were riding low and bunched on her hips, her head lifted so high that she actually seemed taller than usual. "You are not adorable, Jethro."

He intentionally watched her ass as she stalked away from him, cocked his head into studying the firm curves of it in his pants as he blindly lifted the coffee and sipped at it. His lips carried farther half smirking as his glance to her tightened back and bare shoulders and knotted up hair as she stomped back up the stairs.

Well, Round Two was his, at least.

He couldn't help himself from grinning into the lip of the cup as she slammed the door closed a second time.

* * *

"Over four months." His voice had a slowly dissolving hush to it, a quietness that tentatively washed out between them. "Not bad. Not great, but not bad."

By the time she lifted her head into his appraisal he'd bitten into the second half of the sandwich she'd left for him, chewing slowly as he held her searching glance.

Kate held onto an intentionally flat tone, "First real fight?"

He nodded his head into a lift of his shoulders before letting his body slant wearily into the door frame, swallowing hard before he the other hand lifted the coffee cup between them in caution. "Is it over? Or are we still going?"

She studied him while she considered it, keeping the smile that was wanting on her lips tamed down as thinly as possible. She had to admit, were she to step away from how annoyed she still was with him, that he was devilishly cute in the boyish way he was just waiting in the doorway. Like a mischievous child, extraordinarily pleased with himself but realizing he should probably show some slip and semblance of remorse.

His eyes tended to give his true intentions away. It hadn't taken her all that long to learn that lesson.

"Well, you're not getting anything near sex tonight. Frankly you probably shouldn't even sit next to me right now." Kate muttered as she leaned forward over the paperwork she'd spread across the coffee table, blowing out a breath as she leveled her elbows into her knees, hands folded together but stretched forward. "Three months, technically. I wasn't here for one of them."

"Four." His correction was sharply distinct, quick and all Gibbs in its delivery. "Distance doesn't matter."

 _Stop it. Stop being sweet._

She felt her smile widen before she chewed into her bottom lip, at first avoiding allowing him to see how warmly the words had curved on her.

"I'm leaving in less than a week, Gibbs." She murmured into rubbing her fingers together, finally lifting her head to how stiltedly he was holding his coffee chest high and the half a sandwich along his side.

So oddly domestic. So honestly real in the way he flinched at her as his weight seemed to shift harder into the frame. Like she'd thrown the weight of the words right into his gut and he'd lost the air he'd been holding.

He blinked at her, face slacking passive. "I realize that, Caitlin."

She understood suddenly that her scheduled departure was, probably, why they'd actually fought. That in combination with his mounting frustration over a case that had been riding on his shoulders so heavily that they seemed sunken under it. He'd been dark eyed and his jaw had to have been aching constantly for as often as she'd seen him bitingly flex it as he ground his teeth tightly pressed.

She hadn't planned to spend the night with him, had seen (heard and felt) the warning signs every time she'd passed through the bullpen. He wore his frustration so plainly, like an article of clothing he'd drawn onto his body because he'd be weather beaten without it. His voice carried it stinging throughout the entire space and, at one point, she'd completely avoided his floor just to keep from hearing the flash-bang-break of his annoyance. Detour to Forensics so that she could silently and sympathetically nod into the way Abby just vented about how snappish and brash he was being.

Poor girl just didn't know the half of it. He'd been brusque and rough and without remorse for days.

Kate had just swallowed it, knowing he was feeling like he was foundered up somewhere.

She'd known that when the sex had gotten rougher, faster, and decidedly more desperate.

When he'd started kissing her like his own lungs were stifling him and his only release was the air he could drag up from down in her lungs.

So she'd planned on giving him a swell of space and breathing room while he tried to pace out his case. It was a habit she'd gotten into whenever his eyes had sparked that certain shade of blue. But he'd stopped her at the base of the stairs on her way back to her office, playing ignorance to the whipped way Tony side-eyed the both of them. He'd just blinked a sort of begging at her. His fingers had tugged against the sleeve of the shirt she was wearing as he'd murmured a surprising pleading over her.

" _Prikhodi domoy."_

… _come home._

She'd nodded silent and accepting agreement, even knowing it was probably an absolute mistake to pen the both of them into that house when he was ready to rip into something and she was losing patience with his self flagellation.

… she wasn't sure when she'd stopped being able to tell him 'no'.

Probably more than a month before, when she'd waited until she'd thought he'd been asleep - reaching to open the closet door and hearing him chuckle into the pillow as she'd moaned a sweetly pleased sound over the shelving that braced up the wall.

"I don't..." He seemed truly uncomfortable as he shifted his shoulder higher up the frame. "M'not usually on this side of the leaving, Kate."

"I know."

He swallowed into her quiet acknowledgment. "It's... this case."

She nodded slowly, giving him a slow smile of acceptance. "I know."

He certainly wasn't going to apologize. She never expected him to.

The grace in him so cleanly adhering to his rule about not apologizing was that it meant she didn't need to swallow more than a short inch of her own pride either.

The reality was that the way he was looking at her from across the room, a half sandwich in one hand and coffee in the other, glasses exactly where she'd left them on his face... reality was, he didn't necessarily need to apologize.

He'd find a way to do it that didn't involve having to say it.

Probably had something to do with the drafting paper he'd tried to hide when she'd been downstairs.

 _A towel rack in the upstairs bathroom would be sorta nice... although, linen cabinet would be better._

Embarrassed surprise at the fleeting thought had her blinking sharply into the way he leaned forward, lifting the half a sandwich in her direction. "You gonna hurt me if I sit down?"

She just shook her head marginally, shrugging it off in silence as he studied her.

"Katie - "

Her hand waved off at the way his voice had wended toward remorseful, ignoring how apologetic he was coming across as she pointed to the papers. "Come help me with this?"

His head cocked in wary surprise, his eyes slimming thin enough to make him look like he nearly distrusted her intentions. "What?"

"Building a time line." Kate shrugged farther over the table, shifting as she drew her legs up under her and shoved the papers around with a measure of obvious frustration. "These movements don't make sense to me. I think I'm looking at it from the wrong angle. There's no reason he should be going from - "

"He?" The full length of him had shifted forward and he set his cup to the table, leaning a canted glance over the papers as he stepped around the end of the table and closer. The size of him seemed guardingly comforting, his hand skiffing her shoulder before unconsciously tugging at her hair.

She shrugged as she glared over the reports. "Target."

"Saurel." His finger was tracing up the back of her ear as he took another bite, chewing solidly as he perused them. She slanted a look up at him, letting her head turn tighter toward the touching rather than away from it as he focused on the paperwork, squinting out of habit even with his glasses on.

"Yes." She slid her eyes closed into the slicking of his finger back down the shell of her ear, smirking into the way his thumb and forefinger put pressure against it. "You gonna help or just interrogate?"

"More coffee first?" He was already bending into picking up his cup again and she let herself slide a glance over him, exhaling into the sturdy stretch of his back.

"Please. And the strawberries?"

He nodded as he leaned over the coffee table, a conspiratorial smirk hedging one side of his mouth. "Sugar?"

He'd figured out her sweet tooth about as quickly as he'd figured out how to make her forgive him regardless of why they'd ever started sniping to begin with.

She just nodded as she watched him stuff the last of the sandwich between his lips on the smile, biting it between his teeth as he headed for the kitchen again. He had his own cup in one hand and her empty one in the other, back and shoulders straightened up again under his hoodie as he passed the dining room table.

She hated to admit it... hated to smile into the realization that even with food hanging out of his mouth he was still... actually adorable.

Infuriating, incorrigible, absolutely impossible.

Impossibly perfect at that moment.

"Arrogant, tactless _and_ a gutless son of a bitch?" He was nearly laughing from the kitchen, she could hear the proud swing of bemusement in his tone. "You gimme too much credit, Katie."

She rolled her eyes as she slacked roughly back onto the couch, snorting a laugh out as she just grabbed his pillow and curled sidelong around it to wait.

* * *

She'd been in the middle of muttering something about the distance between two foreign cities when he'd finally broken the wall down, turning his head into the side of hers so slowly that she'd swallowed into the shift of movement. The words had drifted off somewhere and she wasn't quite so sure what point she'd been trying to make when he'd just innocently wiped his nose against her cheek and sighed out a silent remorse, as though he were waiting out forgiveness.

Then his head had rose higher, the sound of his inhalation filling her ear as he drew down the smell of her and angled into her hair, "I don't like you leaving."

"I'm coming back." Kate let her jaw angle down, turning her head into his as his hand teased an up and down line on the back of her neck.

"I can't help you when I have no idea where you are."

He'd already said far more on the subject that she'd expected.

Because any other time he would have just swallowed it down and kept himself hush.

"I survived three older brothers and an excruciatingly nosy older sister without you. Catholic school with Sister Judith? Without your help." She noted the arched way his brow lifted before he flicked her a downward glancing. After a moment his head tipped a little before he blinked guiltily back up, his smile ticking up higher.

Yeah, so, he was still a man. And mentioning Catholic school may have been completely intentional.

 _Sorta wish I hadn't burned that skirt..._

She shifted her head closer, nudging against his leaning playfully, "FLETC training, without the assistance of Special Agent Gibbs."

"Kate."

"I guarded a President in an undisclosed location while the world fell apart." The brightened look he flashed her said that he was far more interested in the particulars of that situation than he'd ever verbally allow. "Without you."

"Caitlin."

"I've already done this once." She felt it come off her as more of a whisper than intended, more emotionally invested than she meant. "I have the approval of the Office of Naval Intelligence, Jethro. They don't hand that out like a lollipop at the doctor's office."

He made a noise in his throat that was entirely derisive. "I know that."

The short response was accompanied by a long stretch, a grunt lacing off him as he stuffed the pillow farther back and stretched sideways into the couch cushions. It was a shifting offer, the spread of his chest beneath the Corps sweatshirt looking like the safest and surest place to rest. His hand broached against her elbow and slow fingertips turned up the back of her arm, teasing light touches until she gave in and stretched into him. She let him shift her along with the twist of his hips, dragging her tight into his chest as he sprawled them lengthwise against the cushions.

She couldn't help but kiss him, even if he was a smug bastard.

Couldn't help liking the mingled up mix of bourbon and coffee and strawberries and refuge.

Kate let her lips rub across his as she sighed, "You really are old school."

He just chuckled into the drawling and breathy way she'd said it. "That your nice way of calling me a chauvinist?"

 _In comparison to what I called you earlier? Sure._

"Extremely nice, yes." Her head lifted with a broad smile, catching the amused way he was cocking an arched glance over her.

"How far into ONI are you, Katie?" His hand came up against her, fingers tipping against her temple as his voice went grating again. "Huh? What aren't you letting me see?"

"None of your business." Her eyes dipped closed into the response, avoiding how brightly his glance burned with what almost ( _almost_ ) looked like concern. "And not that far."

He was silent in response.

 _Like that's a huge surprise._

When she opened her eyes he was wearing an expression than almost seemed painful, somewhat embittered and nearly angry.

So that's what assumed betrayal looked like on Leroy Jethro Gibbs...

It would have been oddly attractive if he hadn't been lending it in her direction.

Kate lifted her head up farther, fingers scrapping up the fabric of his hoodie and tugging, "Is that really the problem here? That really what's pissing you off?"

"No." The speed of his dismissal made her think that it was a lie, but that he probably didn't even realize that himself. "But someday, maybe. SecNav know where you sleep?"

"I don't doubt that he does." She admitted. "Hasn't become an issue yet."

"It will."

Kate nodded into the cocked and quick way he'd asserted it. "We'll deal with it."

He squinted at her, eyes darkening a deeper shade of blue as his head angled farther over hers, "So you have met with him."

She jerked harder into fabric, not letting up on tugging him tighter. "This _is_ actually what's bothering you."

His head slanted away from her accusatory searching, jaw lifting into how quickly he'd avoided her eyes.

"Jethro."

He still didn't return her glance, jaw flexed firm and tight as he focused his glance away from her and intentionally into a void spot somewhere center of the room "I can't help you if I don't know where you're at."

"Trust me." An almost laugh escaped her throat as she studied his profile, still mildly surprised that he'd let her scrutiny lean up this close to his insecurity. "The day I need your help, you will know exactly where I'm at. Okay?"

When he did look at her, it was a full stuttered stop to the movement of her lungs.

Because the look he gave her was blaringly bright in its accusation. "We made a deal that had nothing to do with... you remember? Nothing to do with sex."

"I do." Kate acquiesced quietly, letting her palm go flat and still into the spread of his chest. "And I'm saying, when I need your help, I'll make sure you know it."

"What if you can't?"

"Then you'll know that too." She had no doubt that if she were in serious trouble, somehow he'd sort the where and why of it. He was unassailable in his ability to bite onto a bone and not let his teeth out of it until he was done and satisfied. "You're a pretty smart man, you'll figure it out. You and Abby have that map ready for round two?"

The map, which Abby had proudly shown her weeks before, had been something they did not discuss. Not even in teasing. Not even in arguing or frustration. It was negated by the both of them, an untouchable subject. She wasn't completely sure why... but because it seemed like something too close to evidence that they were to routinely be separated, regardless of the fact that they so quickly seemed otherwise inseparable. It seemed, in the scientist's space, to be the very tangible and empirical proof that they were not _really_ allowed to have what they were holding onto.

She'd given the other woman a sweet smile and played into tracking that silly string with her finger – because, really, it had been one hell of a sweet gesture on Abby's part. It had spoken to how strongly the younger woman had accepted her, primarily based upon the strength of his acceptance.

But she tried to avoid looking at it when she was in that space. And she knew he did too.

"That was all Abs." Jethro Gibbs did not blush - but he got damn near close to it sometimes – and generally it was preceded by a shattering grin. It wasn't quite so heart stopping this time, but it was still giving her a hell of a hard time when it came to deep breathing. "I had nothin' to do with it."

"You're the reason she has that map." Kate poked against him, enjoying the shied way he tucked from her accusing finger as she lowered her voice. "You've gotta trust me, Gibbs. You have to trust my judgment."

"Yeah, I know." He sounded somewhat ashamed at least, somehow apologetic, regardless of his rules. "Doesn't make me worry any less."

 _You are (imperfectly) the perfect storm of my century._

She couldn't say that, though. Couldn't tell him anything but "You're adorable."

A surging look of distaste crested his features as he shook his head to the side, eyes thinned as he finally tugged his glasses off and clattered them to the table as a movement of deflection.

He seemed distinctly uncomfortable with the assessment. And she was loving it.

"You are." She pried up higher and tighter into his chest, rubbing at the Marine Corps logo without really realizing how tightly she was grasping into the maroon material. "Despite outward appearances and all surly attempts to imply otherwise."

"Shut up, Todd." The change in his tone was exceedingly familiar, because suddenly it was all tease and welcome mischief and it rumbled more than rattled off him. "Or I'll shut you up myself."

She smiled her eyes closed again, let him curve his hands on her ribs, "Promises, promises."

* * *

She hogged him.

She didn't hog the bed – especially considering they'd just stayed sprawled across his couch.

But even when they were in bed, it wasn't the mattress she was stealing space from. It was him. And he was, admittedly, pretty okay with it. It meant that more often than not she stayed sloped into his chest with her head downwardly tucked into his sternum, her fingers cradled up near her face. Her other hand had wedged underneath her side and curled up along his ribs, fingers digging in the thick fabric of his hoodie. The hoodie he sure as hell didn't need now - he was damn near dying of heat stroke. She was consistently twice as warm as him and she was suddenly a doubling down weight of pure heat puddling over him as she made a little whimpered noise in her sleep.

"Hey." Long fingers rubbed insistently into the back of her skull, frictioning into her hair and against her scalp. "Rosefern."

"It was just a codename." That near whine in her tone was undeniably linked to a lack of sleep, or the interruption of it. Otherwise, she generally tended to curb it. But when she was too weary or not completely awake, that's when she got pouty. Considering she was otherwise usually anything but, he just exhaled through it.

"I know that." He breathed patience out in response. "You're dreaming."

"People do that when they sleep, Gibbs." Her face was buried into the center of his sternum, words muffled but still biting and miffed. "And by 'people' I mean those of us who don't stare at others while _they_ sleep."

"I like staring at you."

 _I like learning every inch of you._

She lifted her head slowly, the jumbled colors in her eyes all darkening farther than usual, "Did you seriously just wake me up to flirt with me?"

"Nope." He just barely shook his head.

"Then why?"

"You're smothering me." He gave her a taunting wink as he wiped a palm against the sweat that was sheening his forehead, slicking it back into his hair. "Lay off, woman."

A muzzily annoyed look flicked over her features as she stretched her hands into his chest, her hips shifting her weight as she felt how sweat damp the fabric seemed. Kate groaned an unhappy noise into the densely warm air and pressed up off his chest, straddled into his lap as she poutedly watched over him. Her fingers jerked at the sweatshirt before she just leaned back, sleep still making her face seem innocently young and incredibly perturbed.

"Off." Two rapid tugs jerked at the thick fabric, her voice impatient in its order.

Gibbs slanted his head toward the back of the couch, letting his glance lower slowly down the front of her before his fingers did the same, starting just below her breasts to stroke down her stomach and match her doubled pulling. "You first."

"I told you no sex." She murmured into how tightly he was tucking the stretched fabric of her tank against his fingers, letting her eyes lift toward his as she exhaled.

"I do what I'm told?" The words rose into her space as he lifted his shoulders, the hand that had been tangled up in her shirt lifting and slanting her farther back as he worked the fabric up.

"Rarely." Kate sighed off, allowing him the shift as he drew the shirt up and off her.

He smiled, small and tentatively, as he fingered the fabric. "Part of my charm."

She gave him a snort before her hands rucked up the bottom of his sweatshirt and forced both shirts from him, shucking them to the floor along with hers as she leaned forward. "Barely."

He took up what little space she'd left him to slide his hands up her sides, enjoying the rise of her breasts just in front of his face as he pried her into arching by the force of his fingers. "Don't tell me 'no', Kate."

She considered him quietly and he watched how still and unreadable she seemed, her head tipping slowly as he skiffed his fingertips along each side of the bottom of her bra. "What would you do if I did?"

He swallowed hard, ignoring the fact that everything south of his (too damn tight) belt buckle was telling him to beg. For forgiveness, for a smile, for her, for all of it. For everything/anything he could get.

 _Just suck it up, Gunny. Beg for Christ's sake._

At least, trying to ignore it as she watched him with complete stillness.

"Try to convince you otherwise." He settled for tugging against the elastic of her bra and his libido threatened to cut off oxygenation to the parts he needed in order to still function, well, ever.

Her eyes widened into his playfulness, a still sleepy shrug on her as she blinked, "Then no."

 _Screw it. Just get on your goddamn knees._

"Please?" _Eh. She's worth it._

"I said no." She poked into his chest, found him too sturdy for all that much shifting and impishly gave another jab lower on his sternum. A near grunting sound of amusement came off him when she frowned at his stillness and then used two fingers to press into his ribs.

Gibbs caught her fingers, grasping them up as he cocked a questioning into her thready whispering, "Caitlin?"

"Convince me." She shrugged supposed complacence at him, the smile she'd been trying to trap up escaping as she used the other hand to start lightly poking into his ribs on the other side. "Get to work, Gunny. It's gonna take some considerable effort on your part."

Huh... Challenge accepted. Not that he'd consider getting her to come in his mouth 'work.'

Seemed more like full participation sport for selfishly gratifying entertainment purposes but, hell – heigh-ho, heigh-ho.

 _Put me in, Coach. I'm ready._

He chuckled as he caught both her hands up and locked them still, jaw lifting into how interestedly she was watching over him. "You seem to think."

Her head lifted sharply, a whole slew of soft dark hair already slipping loose from the way she'd knotted it up, making her throat look like an invitingly framed place for his mouth to land. "Are you implying that I'm easy?"

"I'm implying," so he licked the words up the side of her neck, ribbed them just under her ear in that ridiculously slow way he knew she hated to love so much, "that you're probably already considerably wet."

She gave him a moan that had started in her lungs and he'd been able to feel it breathe there beneath the lay of his tongue as he'd rubbed his mouth back down between her breasts.

The fact she was still wearing her bra was sorta pissing off the teenage boy part of his brain that still hadn't completely come to grips with the fact that this was an event that could be repeated and didn't need to happen all at once.

"Aren't you?" He cheekily lifted his head up, kissing chastely against her jaw as he finally got the clasp worked free, feeling the fabric surrender into his hands as her mouth hovered a little closer to his but denied meeting it.

"I usually am when you're around."

 _Aw, hell..._

… _... really?_

 _Not fair, not fair, not fair at all._

Cue 'teenage boy brain' and what could only be referred to as a 'gulp'. "Yeah?"

"Mmm." She seemed to realize exactly which brain was most active because she tipped her head down into his as she made the sound, letting him drag fabric away and kissing lightly and softly against the line of one eyebrow.

 _How the hell does she do that?_

 _Uber-Minx to Nightingale in the fraction of a sonic boom._

"When'd that start?"

Kate laughed into his ear, her breathing obviously a little rattled but the sound of it still clearly happily amused as her hands cradled against his ears. "Oh, I'm so not telling you that."

The way her palms were cupping the sides of his head had the rush of blood thundering an echo back and forth in his brain and he let her thumbs rub just in front of both of them as she gamely just aimed his mouth lower to exactly where she wanted it. Not shy anymore. Not nearly as nervy as she'd been at first. Something had distinctly changed in the weeks, months. She'd let him outright own more of these moments than just temporarily renting them.

He'd mortgage most everything for her.

And that was a realization that was terrifying and erotic at once.

"Sure you are." He'd already started stroking against her breasts, palms full against them as she wandered his mouth slowly farther between them. "When?"

"I'm not – mmm." Her negation had been startled still by the tug he gave against one nipple while his tongue lathed against the other, her chest cinching up as she whimpered. "Bathroom."

His head shot up quickly, his eyes brightening on an unchecked smirk as her palms went flat to the sides of his face, "On Air Force One? Seriously?"

She slapped sharply against his shoulder, eyes thinning as her jaw dug down. "Don't be an ass."

"I'm just sayin'." He felt the laughter come off his throat and curbed it at the way she frowned over the sound, softening his smile as he let his fingers grace sloping down her stomach. "That woulda been a phenomenal entrance to the Mile High Club. Not the greatest timing, but - "

"This is you trying to convince me?" Kate's voice went a little higher, shifting herself up and inadvertently jamming into his crotch in a way that felt like punishment enough. "Like I don't feel bad already? It wasn't a conscious decision. Now you're gonna make fun of me?"

He caught his hands against her and tugged her tightly into his chest, kept her still as he shifted their angle against the cushions. The trusting way she just turned with him was enough to show that she wasn't necessarily as upset as she seemed. Her palms slaked over his shoulders and rubbed the muscles that spanned up into the back of his neck as he reached into her hair, sluicing it down her back. Gibbs looked up at her, letting her thread her fingers up into his hair as he inched forward on the edge of the couch, watching her reaction as he carefully plied her up and onto the edge of the coffee table. A surprise had widened her eyes at how deftly he'd made the shift of movement, just before a smile tipped over her lips.

"I'm not making fun of you." Couldn't help the proud smirking though, not while she was watching him with brightly wide eyes. His voice softened as he let the smile go warmer with affection, leaning forward into her. "I'm surprised."

The slimness of her shoulders seemed stronger when she flexed them into shrugging. "Well, so was I."

He pressed long palms onto her thighs before leaning forward, head still lifted by the light touch of her small hands as he knelt into her space and between her legs. "He wasn't what you needed, Kate."

A wry look pinched her eyes thin,"Paging Special Agent Cocky."

"I don't mean in bed." His head dipped down and away from her touch, mouth openly wiping against the fabric of his sweats. "Although..."

"What?"

"I do know what you need." He was intentionally rubbing his face against the inside of one thigh, the fabric of his pajamas warm with laundry soap and the smell of her. "Don't I?"

When he rubbed his nose and mouth directly between her thighs she dug against the back of his head, whimpering at how comfortable he seemed in just nuzzling against the fabric.

"How do you say things like that with a straight face?" She rattled out over him, scraping her nails against his scalp as one of his hands lifted, fingers stretching under her while he rubbed his thumb down the center seam, finding its edge and grinding it into her clit without warning.

She wasn't wearing anything under them.

 _Figures, fucking little fox. My little fox._

He smiled rapidly, the other hand lifting her right leg against his shoulder and forcing her to steady her shifting, the papers rustling under the movement. "By saying exactly what I mean."

"You _are_ extremely direct."

 _And you are extremely wet, sweetheart._

Damp enough that he could feel the moist heat of it under his thumb, dug the ridging of the fabric harder into her clit as he watched her eyes flutter near closed.

That sound, the one that came off her like she was completely pleased, that was worth begging. And more.

"Exactly." Gibbs gave her a sharp nodding. "Tell me 'yes'."

She made another noise in her throat, one that was complete negation, shaking her head at him as she studied how intently stoic his face had become. "Try harder, Marine. You're not doing a very good job."

"No?" he asked quietly, so quietly that it shivered her up a little into how seething his voice had gone.

Kate shook it off sharply, letting her heel rub a slow up and down against his spine. "Nope."

"Liar." He squinted up at her. "And you call yourself an Intelligence Officer? Naval Intelligence know you can't lie when you're half naked?"

 _Well, hello there, Furious. You're a pretty little thing._

Her eyes had instantly narrowed, lips pertly pouted together as she glared down over him and wiped a fingertip across his forehead. "DiNozzo would be trying harder right now."

Well... shit. Round Three was officially hers.

Because that one had plowed him right in the gut. "That's it, wise-ass. You're done."

She freely laughed into the growling he raked along her stomach, her hand loosely rising into the back of his head as his mouth went tripping down against bunched fabric. Both his hands caught against the warm fabric and he jerked down against it, forcing her to laughingly scrabble back onto the table despite the shift of her own paperwork. He laughed into how awkwardly tangled they got for a moment as he unclothed her, catching the smile she was wearing as she put both palms back and just let her head drop back in pleasure as he slicked his fingers against her. The fact that he'd managed to completely loosen her hair was a personal victory, his head tipping to study the way it had slicked off her trim shoulders as he drove a finger up inside her. He'd seen silk like that before, in another country. He could touch this one though, wrap his fingers into it and tug in.

"Gibbs." Yeah, that sloping moan of his name and the way she lazily looped her toned leg back over his shoulder? That was a little bit of wicked.

He smiled over how pretty she looked, let himself exhale as he nubbed his thumb against her clit and brought a sharp noise off her. "Hmmm?"

She accused him of being smug? She was downright self-satisfied as her head lifted and she shrugged her shoulders higher into the slow tip of her head. "Try harder."

He damn near felt the sound she made from low in her throat as he smiled widely, congratulated himself on still being able to make her ache to see it. "I haven't actually started yet, Kate."

She clipped him closer with a flex of her leg and a slant of her shoulders, "Coulda fooled me."

* * *

He was, yes, impossible. An unapologetic and smug son of a bitch.

Impatient. Cocky. Derogatory. Tactless.

He was both stubborn and controlling (while often being obnoxiously laissez-faire about anything nearing the possibility of an _actual_ human emotion).

 _Okay... that last one isn't fair, Kate. You know that's not completely true._

"Jesus." He was pressing two fingers tighter into her while he watched each rise of pleasure crest over her face with an affectionately pleased smirk creasing his lips, his entire body a taut stretch of incomparable patience. "Gibbs."

She watched his smile twitch a little wider as he kept a tantalizingly slow and driving pressure going back and forth and around on her clit. "I'm not hearing a 'yes', Caitlin."

He was... incorrigible. Impish. _And_ impossible.

Because she wasn't sure how it was possible that he was still wearing his goddamn pants.

 _Pants are officially stupid. I hate pants. Down with pants. No, seriously._

… _except the ones you wore yesterday. Those were... fine-ass-pants._

He was laughing into her throat, body stretched leaning over hers as he nipped along her jaw, made possessive little marks of red down the side of her neck. "What?"

How much of that had been out loud?

Kate felt her throat ( _fucking traitor_ ) moan under his mouth as he slid his fingers slowly out of her, teasing the dampness of them against her right thigh. "Your pants. They annoy me."

Impossibility said he should have come in his boxers already. At least once.

Instead he was just going to mercilessly torture her with pants.

"Do they?"

Denim rubbed and rasped between her legs, the firm musculature of his thigh drove up and – _oh, holy hell._

She nearly jumped off the table as the fabric raked against her sensitive clit, nails scraping against his shoulders as she pulled them closer together with a meek sound of surprised but complete approval.

He laughed again as she buried her face close to his, his nose wedged up just in front of her ear, "You are soaked, sweetheart."

She tried to pull herself out of the luscious clouding of the moment long enough to somehow, in some way, tip the balance back in her favor. Sorta useless if she considered it rationally, though. She didn't want the upper hand, because his hand was full and warm and safe. Damp warmth, calloused but not scraping, firm in its exploration of everything he'd already explored before with fingers and tongue and had still decided needed to be a subject of reconnaissance all over again. Screw it. Let him have it. She couldn't necessarily think of anyone in particular she currently wanted to own it more.

She couldn't necessarily think of anyone else at all.

He was completely in control, entirely empowered as he braced one flat palm on the most recent report she'd received from Snyder as he'd pandered his way around Tehran. Gibbs' other hand was running the softest damn touches from her breasts down her stomach and along one hitched up thigh. Swinging back up to start the run of light touches all over again, pausing _here_ when she sighed, rubbing pressure _there_ when she moaned. His left knee pressed the table to her right, his other leg riding into her as he interestedly followed each swallow she made and each skim of her teeth or tongue to her lips with bright eyes.

Each forward drive of his thigh, rubbing damp fabric into her clit, each shift had her giving up a little more on any form of reason or any attempt to win a goddamn thing.

Didn't matter. Not really.

He was the one challenge she wanted to lose to, over and again.

And, really, the incremental slowness of the kiss he offered seemed to be a balance all on its own.

Kate traced the tip of a finger along his belt as it ended, rubbed against the metal of the buckle before raising her hand up against his stomach and pressing flat. "If I tell you 'yes' will you take your pants off?"

"They really giving you that much trouble?" He breathed raggedly over her, bemused but feral bright eyes irretrievably focused on her mouth as she nodded in slow agreement.

She couldn't not smile when he couldn't keep his searing eyes off her lips. Obvious and repetitive cycle, she knew. Ridiculously fun one, though. "They're deplorable. I can't stand the sight of them. Off."

Gibbs just gave a snort of amusement when she tugged against his belt, the hand that had been tracing the tightly tucked muscles of her stomach lifting to catch on her wrist. He drew her hand tighter into his front, watching her face with such an interested and prowling scrutiny that she felt her throat flush as he spread her fingers down his zipper and laid her palm flat against his erection.

"Ah." His head cocked toward that ridiculously familiar tilt of unequivocal demand. "I'm listening."

 _Right, Todd... what was that about getting the upper hand?_

 _Because he's him and you're naked._

"How about just 'please'?" She watched him shift, shivered off the sudden loss of the sheer expanse of _him_. It wasn't an entire loss though, his hands were gently dragging the tops of her thighs and curving on her knees as he settled between them.

"After some form of agreement, sure."

She'd had a snarky argument to make, she was sure. Somewhere. She'd seemed to have left it somewhere else in his quiet house because it was completely lost when he held her eyes with his and still managed to lean a kiss against the inside of her knee. Kate let her elbows sink back when he just flicked her a wide smile, shook his head like she was his very own impossibility and dropped his mouth against her clit. Tongue first. God, damn, hell. He always let his tongue work her over first. Then closed his lips against her and she was never quite so sure that he was her absolute favorite mistake as when he added those gorgeous hands to the mix. Trading fingers inside her to wiping against her clit as he tasted and licked and then drove his tongue into her.

All the blood should have been rushing to her head, because she'd just slacked back flat to the table.

But she was pretty sure that it was pooling directly between her thighs as he caged her legs up higher against his shoulders and doubled down the attention he was giving her clit.

This so wasn't going to last very long.

He'd been too long in his teasing and she wanted more than just his fingers and tongue inside her.

"Jethro." The tug she jerked into his hair was the only warning she was willing to give him if he hadn't been able to comprehend the slinging moans she'd unintentionally been loosening off her lungs.

"Yes." His mouth rubbed against her pelvis before his head lifted, eyes blaring bright in a satisfied warmth and pleasure. "It's just three letters, Caitlin."

A sound that slanted somewhere between growling and groaning throttled from her throat. "So is 'ass'."

"Damn, Katie." His jaw was slightly stubbled as he rubbed it into her stomach, a finger driving into her once again. "Didn't think we were goin' there tonight but - "

"Jethro." This time she tugged against his ear, smiling into the breathy laugh he laid across her thigh regardless of the effort she'd taken to keep it swallowed.

"Yes," his voice went taunting, higher than normal and lofty like a teacher waiting for his student's repetition, "please."

His mouth took another slow turning tour between her legs, two fingers sliding in and out of her while he sucked against her clit.

She grumbled something that got as close to 'no' as she could muster when the English language was a mush puddle in her head. He was lucky it didn't come out closer to 'go to hell'.

 _Please, don't. Stay here. Stay here, oh, hell... right there, you beautiful bastard._

"Caitlin."

She let the pout into her tone, the one she knew he found more adorable than he ever really wanted her to see. "Hmmm?"

"Yes?" He was licking the question and kisses against the inside of one thigh and, had any damn synapses been properly firing, she could have probably figured out which one.

"Yes." Kate cupped her palm against the back of his head, enjoying the way she could blindly silk her thumb against his hair as he chastely landed a kiss against the inner curve of her knee. "Da, dorogoi."

"Please?" His voice inherently implied the repetition.

So she gave it to him. In a way. "Pazhalusta."

About time he'd given up that groaning from deep in his lungs.

She'd been waiting for that signal flare.

Usually she found it in his eyes before hearing it in his voice – but he was busy grazing his lips and tongue and teeth against her calf.

And then he was shifting, his body quick and completely sure in his movements as he dropped her legs, hands slowly guiding them lower as his head lifted.

"That's my sweet girl." Did he realize how much full body aching resulted from that particular tone of voice? He had to know. Somehow as he sank back against his heels and pulled her sitting up, he had to. He was too remarkably astute not to know what that delicious grating rumble did to her. "C'mere, lisen'ka."

 _Did he... nuh uh. No way. The mouth and the fingers made me incoherent crazy._

"Fox?" She let him draw her down into him, let him straddle her legs to his sides.

"My fox." The groaning admission in his voice was possessively heated and nearly self conscious at once, the odd (coming from him) combination hushing the words between them. "My - "

Her mouth stuttered him from continuing, tongue catching against his as she dug her fingers against his throat to still him. She sucked against his tongue, felt his arms cage back along her ribs tightly as she leaned harder up into his chest.

"Moya malen'kaya lisitsen'ka."

 _My little fox..._

 _Oh… oh, that charming son of a bitch._

She felt ridiculously limp but unexplainably secure settling down into his lap, let her head relax into his shoulder as her arm looped against the other. Kate let a dragging moan of a noise rub against comfortingly warm skin as she tucked her face into the side of his neck and raked her nails against the trim and velveted shortness of the hair at the back of his head.

"Katie?" He laid his lips somewhere in her hair and she smiled at how softly he wiped them through it – even if it wasn't red. "Yeah?"

She just nodded agreement, leaning her head shyly into his charmed laughter as he shifted her up enough to try and get his belt undone. The slivered frustration in his exhalation echoed against her temple and she dropped her hands, fingers pushing his away so that she could work the belt and the button and when she got his zipper undone she turned her head closer into the near silent murmuring he was rubbing into her hair. She could only make out a few of the words he was giving her, most of them in Russian. Most of them breathed quietly against her hair, her temple, her cheek and throat.

By the time he was pulling her down, driving his length up into her, she was completely lost in the hummed encouragement of his voice. And maybe she didn't understand half of what he was saying - both because she was having a hard time tracking conversation and because he was vacillating languages in a such a way that she couldn't keep from clamping her teeth onto his shoulder. But he was hard and full inside her and that was all she'd really wanted since he'd stuffed that stupid sandwich in his mouth and cocked her a ludicrously beautiful smirk.

One of his hands clamped into her hair as she rose and fell against him, dragging her head back and baring her throat to his whispering while the other hand roved her ribs and stomach and breasts.

He just kept murmuring and she could barely keep track of half of the promises or endearments or truths he wiped against her.

And she knew before he even reached his stroking hand between her legs that she'd come damn near instantly.

He whispered something that sounded unbelievably like loving along the hollow of her throat as she rattled out a moaning and imploded into him.

And he said it (but silently) against her lips as he came.

"No." She refused his shifting, clutched against his shoulders as she listened to his lungs reach for air, her face angled flush into the side of his neck. "Stay here."

"Stay _here_." It was as near to demanding as his ragged breathing would allow. Which, considering it was him, was still pretty damn stern. "Just stay home."

It was the second time (second language) in a day that he'd said 'home' like it was shared property, both physical and conceptual. She tried not to let him see that she'd noticed but he made her look at him, his long fingers caging her head up by her jaw as he studied her parted lips.

"You know I have to - "

He licked against her bottom lip to interrupt her, intentionally taking her argument into his mouth as he slid his tongue against hers and angled his head into driving the kiss harder.

"I think I've proven that I'm pretty persuasive, Kate."

"I have to go." Remorse and apology heaved in her tone as she laid a flat palm against his flushed forehead, wiped back against his hair as his shoulders simultaneously slacked back into the front of the couch. "You know that."

"Yeah, I do. Doesn't mean I have to like it." His words were mumbled and grumbled and when his head came back forward he aimed it into her shoulder, the fingertips of one hand skimming up and down her spine. "And I don't like it. Okay?"

Kate made a near laughing noise as she nodded, shifting with him as he stretched his legs farther under the table and curled her forward, his back stretching out a little farther against the couch. "Okay."

"So am I adorable," his head just marginally turned toward hers, a smirk half made on his mouth, "or an ass?"

"Not mutually exclusive in your case."

* * *

The both of them had known, probably sooner than the other person would have liked, that there was someone in the house. She'd been half awake when she'd first heard the steps against the living room floor, distracted away from how she'd been rubbing her lips slowly down the slanted twist of his spine. Her head lifting had given him enough slack to shift up onto his elbow, lungs patiently releasing as he'd listened to the carefully quieted sounds.

And she'd been surprised that there'd been no fear in him as he'd exhaustedly groaned his face into his pillow, spine stretching out straighter as she'd pushed up from the mattress and let her palm flatten to the cool skin of his back.

He'd just accepted the fact that an unnamed person was wandering the first floor of the house.

Annoyance growled into his pillow before he'd shifted out from under the naked length of her and grabbed at his boxers on his way to the door.

"Stay." He lazily waved her still on the bed, stepping into his boxers as he roughed a hand against his hair, blinking dazedly through the room in search of a shirt.

"Gibbs - "

"I got it." He shook off, taking the discarded t-shirt she'd lifted from the opposite side of the bed. "It could be anybody."

Well, yes... _that_ exactly.

Stubborn jackass.

* * *

"Katya? Coffee." His nose took an intimately rubbing swipe against her hair, the cup he'd aimed into the center of her chest lifted in silent urging as he crowded into her hip. His other hand gripped into the button down she'd confiscated before descending the stairs. "C'mon. Ignore him."

She stayed unmoving at first, the warmth of the cup steaming up delightfully at her even as Fornell grinned wildly at her from across the room. It was possible that turning her head into Gibbs' shifting, aiming to bring his mouth down closer to her jaw, was absolutely intentional. More than possible. Probably, likely, intentional. She leaned into the movement, curving her hip tighter toward him as she curled closer to the larger span of his chest as he stayed close. His fingers squeezed affectionately against her hip as he nudged the cup higher once again. And the brushing kiss he wiped against her skin had her eyes slimming in combined pleasure and implied threat as Fornell cast them an arched glance of bemused surprise from the opposite side of the room.

 _Mmm hmm. Point made?_

 _No messing with this one, buddy. Not while I'm around._

She blindly took the cup into both hands, still glaring across the space of his small kitchen as she grunted a noise that could have almost been appreciation had she not been scowling so hard. "Why is he here?"

Fornell chuckled dryly in their direction, his hand slow as he lifted the cup that had been perched on the counter. "When I heard the growling I'd assumed maybe she'd lost her ability to converse socially. Didn't realize that was a sexually transmitted - "

"You came into my house, Fornell." Gibbs slacked away from her slightly, his shoulders relaxing as he leaned his hips back into the edge of the counter and flacked his tone tighter. "What? What can I do for the Bureau?"

The FBI agent was still watching her intently, his eyes holding the pointed way she was just interestedly watching him back. "You didn't just join the cowboys, Agent Todd. You seem to be riding side saddle."

So... no, Gibbs didn't need her protection. He was more than capable of handling himself – and especially when it came the the Federal Bureau of Investigation. She'd already seen plenty of evidence in support of his ability to outplay the man that was watching them like he should've been stuffing popcorn into his mouth and slurping on a soda in a darkened theatre.

However, oh, _however_... Fornell wasn't stupid. At least she'd yet to see evidence of ignorance. And his sudden presence in Gibbs' kitchen had her a slight twitchy.

"Gibbs?" She whined it quietly against the lip of the cup, catching the way his head just lifted marginally into the quiet and drawn out pout of his name. "Lemme shoot him."

 _Just once. Lower quadrant. Through and through._

 _I can make it superficial. Mostly._

"Katie." The heat that flushed his voice was all warning and amusement at once and she merely lifted her head into it, catching the way Fornell snorted a silent laugh in her direction.

Still, though... she didn't necessarily _really_ have anything against Tobias Fornell (besides the fact he'd interrupted the one morning she'd had to sleep past six before leaving again). Didn't dislike him – didn't have a reason to, really. And, if she were to be honest, she actually sorta liked him. He'd been pretty clear and professional and honest when they'd met. Hell, he was damn funny sometimes too. There was a glinting of humor that sometimes sparked off him that made a girl's head turn regardless of the fact he didn't look like a GQ man. He was reliable, at least as far as she'd seen. Intelligent and thorough. Warm enough, generally.

Maybe a bit effete, sorta cocky... but, well, which of the three of them wasn't?

But having him in the supposedly safe place felt anything but safe.

Disrupting her contentment was one thing, forgivable.

Drawing Gibbs into something possibly dangerous, when she had a limited amount of time left before being gone for she didn't know how long? Unacceptable.

"You." Gibbs was ignoring her pouted study of the FBI agent, his fingers flickering a dismissive wave in the other man's direction. "Basement. Now."

Fornell lifted a chipped old NIS mug in her direction, a jaunty toast as he flicked a grin half down the front of her before thinking better of it and jerking his head back up to hold her glance. "Have a wonderful morning, Todd."

 _What's left of it..._

There was absolutely no chance of getting Gibbs _back_ into bed just so she could wake him up in the manner she'd planned.

Mostly her mouth, detouring south... she'd been planning to spend an undetermined amount of time licking along his pelvic bone.

 _Fat chance of that now. Tobias Fornell is officially on the Pain-In-My-Ass list._

"Why is he here?" She asked on a hissed whisper as she watched Fornell sip at his own coffee, his steps heavily made and intentionally loud as he headed for the basement door.

Must've invited himself right in, made himself sure as hell comfortable.

Gibbs gave her a shrug, a motion that seemed so very (sometimes annoyingly) unconscious, "Case, I'd assume."

"You couldn't warn me?"

"Ya damn well knew it was him, Kate. You stopped halfway down the stairs." He accused, voice flush with knowing as his eyes thinned. "You were showing off, making some sort of point. What exactly was it? Huh?"

Well, she had stopped halfway down the stairs to... yeah, okay, eavesdrop.

Before putting something on. Something she may have intentionally chosen from his closet.

The hearing on the man was terrifyingly accurate. And she was absolutely busted.

She raked her teeth against her bottom lip as she shrugged, primly licked perfectly sweetened coffee off it before lifting him a supposedly innocent smile and tucking the mug between her breasts. "You just call me 'Katya'?"

His jaw lifted slowly in response to her deflection, the blue of his eyes shading wary as he studied her face. "May have."

 _You can't ignore the dimples, Jethro. I know you._

Her smile slid wider at the thought, eyes following the way he dropped a glance over her mouth as she curled a little farther forward toward his chest. "Cream and sugar in my coffee?"

The stretch of his shoulders blocked up firm and tensed and she bit into her lip again, letting her glance rove his chest before flicking back up as he quietly answered. "May be."

 _Don't be a hero, Gunny. Just give it up._

Kate wiped the edge of the cup along her bottom lip but avoided taking a drink, fighting the urge to smirk as his lips parted in watching the movement. "Still a bit strong."

 _There's no shame in surrender, I promise._

He blinked once at her while he took a long drink from his own cup, exhaling quietly before responding to her obvious teasing, "Strong is better."

"Is it?"

She'd known he was near an edging of a sort, somewhere between distrusting her tease and still enjoying the hell out of it. It was evident in the way his eyes searched her even as a near smirk twitched at his lips. The silence of his response seemed to be the only response he planned to give her but he also wasn't necessarily questioning her all that much anymore. Seemed he was suddenly much more interested in the curve of her smile and the fact that she couldn't keep it hidden. A low note groaning rumbled off his throat as his head dipped farther forward toward hers.

Kate felt her grin go wide and complete, shaking her head slowly under his scrutiny, "You gonna kiss a girl 'good morning' or just stare - "

God, he was exceptional at stalling her up with his tongue.

Whether it was pressing into her mouth or between her thighs, tracking up her spine, finding that sensitive spot just at the back of her knee.

Had it been anyone else routinely interrupting her... she would've given them a verbal smack.

But, really, when it was him... she couldn't manage to do much but grasp him tighter.

"You don't generally have a problem making it evident that _this..._ " her voice dropped low, a purposeful whisper of a sound as she ground forward into his groaning, "is a reoccurring theme. It bothers you that Fornell knows?"

"The man married my ex-wife, krasotka. I'm not all that keen on him seeing you half naked." An obviously victorious half smile tweaked his lips as her eyes widened into the drop of information, her head lifting higher into her leaning. "Could give him ideas."

Kate smiled into the tug he gave against the buttons of the shirt she was wearing, felt it pan wider as he gave her a sweet wink and started backing away from her.

"Hey." She let her hips slant back against the counter on a sigh, glance riding down the length of him with a bit of an intentionally possessive heat. "Good morning, Agent Gibbs."

"Mornin'." He agreed with a dip of his head, a sudden full grin shattering her completely in the middle of his sparse kitchen. "Nice shirt, Todd."

She took a lazily wandering glance down the front of her body, lips pressed together and cup lifted away from herself as she took in the white button down. She made a surprised noise in her throat, as though she hadn't realized exactly which shirt she'd only half buttoned up from her breasts. Made her legs look awfully pretty too. Sure, she could use a tan but, he was right, it was an exceptionally nice shirt.

Kate lifted her head again, tipping a hushed tone in his direction. "Good color, huh?"

A guttural noise came up his throat, head cocking sharply right before he forced himself on a turn toward the basement door, "Absolutely."

She purposefully waited until he was past the frame of the door, head lifting higher as she raised her voice after him. "I want him out the door by seven, Jethro."

Even she couldn't exactly understand how quickly her voice had gotten so comfortably and intimately demanding with him. He didn't seem to mind it usually, though. Not like this. Not when it was also laced with more affection and adoration than she thought should be realistically acceptable.

 _What in the holy hell is he doing to me?_

"What's at seven?" The back leaning way he pressed into the frame made him look so ridiculously young, innocently boyish as he blinked at her.

"Water conservation seminar." Kate let the grin flare through the words, caught the way he tipped his head as she nodded. "Upstairs."

"Yeah? Participation required, Agent Todd?"

"Your presence is requested." She agreed as she lifted the cup back toward her mouth, breathing in the scent of strong but sweet. "At the very least."

He was already gone again, a laugh filling his voice as he headed down the hall, "Yes, ma'am."

* * *

He wasn't sure that he liked her obviously knowing how _very much_ he liked her in white.

Or, for that matter, in any of his shirts. Or just in his kitchen, period.

Frankly, the intentional Caitlin-in-my-kitchen-in-my-best-dress-shirt trifecta had done its job in regards to him - and what a delicious little triumvirate of domestic sexiness. All he'd wanted to do was shove her up onto his counter and jerk her legs apart and start fucking her while he buried his face into that half open shirt - so goddamn hard, fast, rough and slick and just painful enough to feel so damn good.

(To be completely honest, he wouldn't have cared if Fornell had been watching either. It'd serve the bastard right for interrupting what had been the pretty promising slide of her mouth along his lower back.)

And she'd known it too, all of it.

It had been obvious in the mixed green to glossy caramel of her eyes. Which made the idea even better, really. Because she hadn't seemed to have a single problem with it when she'd intentionally just driven herself right into his crotch. His sweet girl was a saucy little harlot when she wanted to be. And, Christ, he'd get on his knees and _thank, thank, thank you God_ for that one.

"Thought she knew better than to trade down. I'm disappointed."

 _Right, you're the asshole who ruined this morning's possibilities just by being you._

"You done?" Gibbs vaulted the last step, turning his body sharply around the bottom of the stairs as he ignored how intently Fornell was watching him. "Or you gonna do a whole skit?"

"NCIS allows you to sleep with your subordinates?"

 _Take a look in my shower in half an hour and I guess you'll find out._

Tobias slanted him a dry look from his perch on the stool, his suited elbow leaned into the workbench, his other hand lifted idly from his leg. "Maybe it _is_ time for a change."

"She's ranked as an International Intelligence Officer by ONI, a Federal Agent of NCIS. It's a completely different department." He ignored the tensing of his spine, lifted his arms into the slats that he'd been framing up the night before, when he was still angry. "Why the hell are you here, Tobias?"

It was obvious how angry he'd been too, at one point. His work looked suddenly shoddy in the particle filled light that was filtering down into the basement.

They'd need to be taken down, measured again, and completely re-worked.

Should make her help just for being a such an adept little pain in his ass.

He lifted his eyes from the frame, letting his glance up toward the other man just to realize that Fornell was watching him. "You're the reason she turned me down."

Gibbs coughed out a laugh, letting his head shake a lagging grin toward the stairs. A withering grin that said he was a lot more patient than the tensing of his forearms against wood grain implied. "Maybe she just has better taste than you give her credit for."

He tasted bitterness in his throat, tried to swallow it back down as the other agent smirked at him.

"You thought Diane was difficult?" The other man was leaning his shoulders forward from the stool, one dress shoe pinning his balance to the dusty floor as he waved loose fingers toward the basement door. "That one's trained to shoot first and question never."

Gibbs considered it a moment, letting his smile bend more gracious and bemused as he squinted it toward the other man, his head cocking into an angle so slight it was barely perceptible. "You jealous, Tobias?"

 _You are. Just fucking admit it._

"A little, yeah." Fornell banked him an openly honest grin and a shrug of his shoulders. "I think I am."

"Ain't gonna happen." Gibbs grinned his leaning heavier against the wood, shaking his head slowly as the FBI agent turned away from him, distracting himself with the papers across the work bench.

"History repeats itself."

He grunted as he watched Fornell lift the plans that were sketched out and strewn over top his case paperwork. "Not with this one."

"What's this? Not a boat."

 _It's hers. Wanna put it down right now, please?_

He let a little grousing into his voice, "Drafting table. Split top. Drawers on the left, raised drawing board to the right. What do you want, Tobias?"

"My team's delivering a body to Doctor Mallard's office at the moment. I took it upon myself to call him." He was finally settling the papers back down to the table, his other hand skimming over the current case file that was spread open before him. "He's on his way."

The shift of the other man's movement, his not-at-all-covert study of private paperwork, calling Ducky himself, taunting about Kate and using Diane as a reference of a threat...

It was show. It was Fornell. It was normal.

But it was sorta tiring.

Especially when he knew all it meant was that he wasn't taking part in any sorta seminar she'd planned for the day.

"What body?" Gibbs asked quietly.

"Corporal Eugene Thompson. Point blank to the forehead."

"Why do you have the remains of the man I've been hunting for more than a week?" He felt how tightly laced his throat went around the words. Felt his frustration crackle on and off him before he'd really even realized it.

"Guess I'll explain that in the car, Gibbs." Tobias was shunting his palms against his slacks, brushing off an invisible coating of non-existent dust before pressing slowly up from the stool. "You gonna tell Todd, or should I?"

He ignored the question a moment, stepping into the other agent's space and leaning over the varnish can that was still settled farther aside of the paperwork. He winced before dipping his fingers into it, fishing out a set of keys and angling them aside so they wouldn't drip over the papers. He could feel the completely befuddled look Tobias was giving him, caught the slow angling of the man's head in his peripheral at the varnish smell bloomed up between them.

"Tell her what?"

Just a grin on the shorter man's face, his head tipped slightly as he waved his hand between them. "That the only marriage you've ever succeeded in keeping is the one to your job?"

Gibbs just shrugged blithely as he headed for the stairs, keys letting slow plops of varnish onto the floor and then the steps as he jogged up them. "She knows that already."

* * *

It was possible that she'd waited until Gibbs was distracted to corner the other man up against the front door. Likely even. Not that she'd admit to doing any such thing.

Her hand lifted her coffee mug into her chest as she stepped closer, a smile on her face that wasn't anywhere near as amused as his was. "Fornell."

"Katya?" He murmured the questioning acknowledgment as an intentional barb, half a smirk on his mouth even as he avoided dropping his glance. "Thought we'd run into each other sooner. Although, I'd also assumed it'd be more work related."

She shrugged, letting her shoulders loosen as she stepped a margin closer into his surreptitious watching of her. "I've been traveling a little."

"I bet." He chucked sardonically. "Where to?"

She ignored the question, ignored the cocky swing of his voice as he rounded to face her, his shoes scuffing against the floor. "What the hell are you dragging him into?"

"Nothing that doesn't already concern him. You think I enjoy handing over evidence to him?"

"I don't think you enjoy handing anything over to him." Her shoulders lifted into the way he was straightening his own body up higher, "But from what I hear you're the one second-hand shopping."

"Wow." His jaw slanted sharply aside as he finally let his eyes travel the full length of her, his features slacking gaunt before he blinked back up at her. "If I'd only known _this_ woman was under that pant suit."

Kate snorted as she lifted the cup closer to her lips, "He knew it."

"Yeah, well, he's got a better radar for - "

"Ready?" Gibbs' interruption was sudden, his body angled closer to hers than Fornell's as he fixed the collar of the jacket he'd tugged on as he'd stepped into their conversation.

"Yeah." The FBI agent agreed brightly, slanting her a grin at the save the other man's arrival had supplied him with. "My car?"

Gibbs just nodded agreement, one hand reaching out to tug into the shirt she was wearing, wrenching the fabric up in his fingers tightly enough to tip her upper balance closer. "You in later?"

"MTAC at nine." Kate answered softly, blinking him a humored smile as he made a sniffed face at her coffee cup and angled his jaw past it.

"Gotcha." He laid his mouth against the slope of her jaw, opposite from where Fornell could possibly see the rub of his lips against skin. "Raincheck?"

She nodded her head closer to his as he kissed just in front of her ear. "Signed and deposited."

"Wanna bring the truck?"

She arched him an intentionally wry glance, sipping down coffee before responding. "Not really."

"Then you're driving me home." Gibbs taunted back quietly, squinting at her even as his eyes seemed to blanch brighter, light filling the space around them as Fornell groaned and swung the door open as an unspoken hint.

He lifted her sodden keys in his hand, still sopping wet with the soapy water he'd obvious used to rinse them with.

"Jackass." And she laughed quietly as she took them into her empty palm, shrugged as she turned her jaw tightly to the right, searching over the other man with an intentional sharpness. "For what, Fornell?"

"What _what_?" Gibbs caged quietly between them as Fornell pinned a look on her that went slanted between entirely amused and slightly scared.

"For the likely possibility of a previously unseen insanity."

Kate glared at him for a moment, holding the intemperate glance even as she leaned forward and rubbed a kiss along Gibbs' semi stubbled jaw, her voice hummed quiet. "Both of you get the hell out."

"She's grumpy this morning." Fornell chuckled the words out, his body already shifting over the sill of the door.

Gibbs just shrugged as her fingers wiped off his sleeve. "You interrupted her Zen time."

"Yeah? What's that look like?"

He winked back at her as he grabbed for the door handle, letting his smile rove over her briefly before he swung around behind the other man. "Y'just don't wanna know, Tobias. Trust me."


End file.
